‘If you need anything, call me.’
But all I need are answers, and she can’t give me those.
With so much going round in my mind, I dread not being able to sleep. But I fall asleep quickly and when I wake up the next morning, I wonder where the turmoil of the evening before had come from. How can Harry be behind the emails? They’re so obviously from Layla, as are the photos I received. There’s no way that Harry could have got his hands on them, or known that Layla and I referred to the tree stump on Pharos Hill as a Russian doll.
It’s strange what he said, though, about never believing that Layla was dead, or that she’d been kidnapped, that he’d always thought she’d turn up one day. He’d never told me that, although he may not have wanted to get my hopes up. I give my head an angry shake, hating that other theories, even more terrible than those that had tortured me last night, have begun to crowd my brain, demanding attention. What if Layla had turned to Harry after she disappeared from the picnic area in Fonches? Is that why he never believed she was dead, because he knew that she wasn’t? Is it possible that he gave her shelter, helped her to hide? But why would he have done that? He didn’t even like Layla. Unless his dislike of her had been a smokescreen. Maybe he’d been in love with her all along, maybe he was the guy she’d slept with in London that weekend. I shake my head, annoyed at myself. First I think Harry’s in love with Ellen, now with Layla.
I turn and look at Ellen, asleep beside me, one arm behind her head on the pillow, the other lying across her chest. Not so very long ago, I would have gently lifted her arm out of the way and gathered her to me, I would have started kissing her while she was still half-asleep. But that was before Layla. The guilt I feel drives me out of bed and down the stairs to the kitchen. The post is lying on the mat and as I stoop to pick it up, I see a brown envelope with the same white sticker on the front, except that this time it’s addressed to me, not Ellen. I don’t have to open it to know that it contains a Russian doll. I take it through to the kitchen, slit it open with a knife and shake the contents into the palm of my hand. As I thought, it’s a Russian doll. Except that this one has had its head smashed in.
THIRTY-NINE
Layla
I knew Finn wouldn’t understand the get rid of Ellen message, at least not fully. Since receiving it, he’ll have been trying to think of ways to tell Ellen that it’s over between them, he’ll be wishing he’d never asked her to marry him in the first place. He’ll have opened his mouth a hundred times, ready to say the words that will bring me back. Yet he’ll never say them, not because he lacks the courage but because he’s too kind to break Ellen’s heart. Which sort of annoys me, because he hadn’t been too worried about breaking my heart all those years ago. I put aside my annoyance because it isn’t important. What is important is that Finn understands what I meant.
It still surprises me that I want to hurt Finn when I love him so much. But there’s something in me that needs him broken, so that I can put him together again just as I want. My disappearance all those years ago hadn’t broken him, not really. His descent into hell had been self-indulgent. Financially stable and without dependants, he could allow himself to wallow in depression. If he’d had to work for a living, or had a child or children, he would have given himself the proverbial kick up the backside; he would have had to, just as I’d had to, in order to survive.
It’s why I’m not letting him off lightly. He must have reached the point where he’s beginning to doubt everything he thought was true and everyone he thought he could trust. Which is exactly what I want.
FORTY
Finn
The doll with the smashed head sends my mind to places it’s never been before. I should have thrown it straight in the bin but, afraid that Ellen might find it, I took it out to my office and put it at the back of my drawer with the others. But its image has burned itself into my brain, taunting me. What is my purpose, it asks, why have I been sent to you? What does my smashed head signify? Who do I represent? The only answers I come up with are dark and terrifying. The doll represents Ellen and whoever sent it – because I’ve gone back to thinking that they might not be from Layla – wishes her harm. Not only that, they are expecting me to do it. The get rid of Ellen message has taken on a whole new meaning. Harry or Ruby – yes, because since Ellen mentioned her, Ruby has crept back onto my list of possible suspects – both know I’m capable of violence. Are they using that knowledge against me? Are they trying to provoke me?
Because sometimes, when Ellen comes and puts her arms around me, when her head is against my shoulder, I find myself wondering what it would be like to move my hands slowly upwards until they reach her neck, and squeeze the life out of her. Sometimes, when she’s asleep next to me, I find myself wondering what it would be like to place my pillow over her face and gently press the life out of her. Sometimes, when we walk along a path with a sheer drop only a few feet away from us, I find myself wondering what it would be like to push her onto the ground below, crushing the life out of her. I can no longer sleep the untroubled sleep of the innocent. Just as I used to have nightmares about having killed Layla, I now have nightmares about killing Ellen.
She hasn’t mentioned phoning Tony again. Since the other night, she’s been giving me space. I enjoy the reprieve, but it doesn’t last long.
‘You look tired,’ she says one morning, after another nightmarish night. She comes over and cups my face with her hands. ‘Maybe we could go away for a few days.’
‘I’d been thinking the same thing,’ I tell her, because suddenly, getting away seems like the best idea in the world.
She searches my face. ‘But first we need to decide what to do about Layla. You said you’d phone Tony.’
‘I will,’ I tell her.
‘If you don’t, I’ll phone him.’ There’s an edge to her voice that I haven’t heard before. ‘It’s making you ill, Finn.’
‘I’m tired, that’s all,’ I say irritably. ‘Anyway, I thought you had doubts about the dolls being from Layla.’
‘I know I said that it could be Ruby but only because I wanted you to be aware that it was possible,’ she says. ‘Ruby is what she is, but she’s not malicious.’ She gives a short laugh. ‘I just wish I knew what Layla wanted.’
Unbidden, the image of the doll with the smashed head comes to mind and I tighten my arms round her. It would be so easy, a voice whispers. All you have to do is move one hand to the back of her head and press it into your chest so that her nose and mouth are covered, and slowly tighten your other arm around her. At one point, when she realises that she can’t breathe, she’ll struggle. But not for long; your height and weight will ensure that it’s over quickly. Then, when the police ask, you’ll lie to them as you lied to them before and tell them that she suddenly collapsed, that she must have had a heart attack.
‘Finn, I can’t breathe.’ Ellen twists her head to the side, freeing it from my grip. She takes a gulp of air, a laugh in her voice. ‘I know you love me but you don’t have to hold me so tightly!’
Shocked, I drop my arms, take a step back. ‘Sorry,’ I mutter, raking a hand through my hair.
‘Will you have a think about where we can go for a few days?’ she says.
I stare at her. Had I really been about to smother her? ‘Yes, of course. I’ll look for something now.’
I go out to my office, my heart pounding. Get a grip, I tell myself, Ellen wasn’t in danger, you weren’t going to do anything.
But there’s a darkness in my mind that won’t go away.
The next day, five days after I received the doll with the smashed head, the office door opens. Expecting it to be Ellen, I fix a smile on my face. But it’s Harry and my smile fades as fast as it came.
‘Hey, don’t look at me like that,’ he reproaches, and I realise he must have seen the mistrust in my eyes. ‘Ellen asked me to come.’
I can’t bring myself to get to my feet and hug him as I usually do. ‘Why?’ I ask.
?
??Because she’s worried about you.’ He looks around for something to sit on and pulls out the stool I keep under my desk. ‘What’s up, buddy?’
I have to find out, I have to know if he’s behind the dolls and the emails. I can’t stand not knowing who I can trust.
‘Are you in love with Ellen?’ I say, trying not to sound accusatory.
His eyes widen in surprise and he opens his mouth, about to say something, and I find myself hoping that he’s going to tell me he is, because then, if Ellen loved him back, it would leave me free for Layla. But he closes his mouth and swallows hard and, because I know him well, I know he’s just bitten back an angry retort.
‘No, Finn,’ he says, looking back at me steadily, realising maybe how important his answer is. ‘Lovely though she is, I am not in love with Ellen, nor have I ever been.’ He gives a short laugh. ‘You must have realised by now that we don’t have the same taste in women? All those girlfriends you had in London, they weren’t your type. Think about it, Finn – they were all carbon copies of mine because you thought they were the sort of girls you should be going out with. But you were never very interested in them. Then you met Layla, as different from those girls as chalk is from cheese. And as you realised quite early on, I couldn’t see what you saw in her.’ He pauses a moment and I wonder what he would say if I told him that only a few days ago, I’d questioned if he was the man Layla had slept with in London. ‘But here’s the thing,’ he goes on. ‘I’ve never experienced true love, I’m not sure it even exists. But if it does, it was what you and Layla had.’
I wait, giving him time to add ‘and what you and Ellen have’ but he doesn’t. The silence stretches out between us. He’s waiting for me to say something and when I don’t, he takes pity on me.
‘Why did you think I was in love with Ellen?’
I can’t tell him that, in a moment of madness, I suspected he was sending me emails and planting Russian dolls, pretending to be Layla so that I wouldn’t marry Ellen.
‘Someone’s messing with my head,’ I say instead.
‘Layla?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Ellen told me she got a Russian doll in the post and that even though it would seem to confirm that Layla is back, you’re reluctant to go to the police.’
‘We agreed to give her a few days.’ I decide to open up to him. ‘I’ve found a couple of dolls that I haven’t told Ellen about.’
‘Right.’ He nods thoughtfully. ‘Where did you find them?’
‘One was outside the house, one on the car, in Cheltenham.’ I don’t mention the others because the list is getting too long. ‘The latest one came through the post. It was postmarked Cheltenham – its head was smashed in,’ I add.
‘They’re not very careful at the post office,’ he says. ‘Probably the franking machine.’
It never occurred to me that it could be anything but deliberate. Have I been sending myself to hell and back for nothing?
‘I wondered if it was damaged on purpose.’
He frowns. ‘What, you think there was some kind of message behind it? A threat, or something?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Boy, Layla must be really angry that you’re with Ellen.’
‘So you think the dolls are definitely from Layla?’
‘Who else could they be from? But she must be seriously disturbed. I mean, to go as far as wishing you actual harm – that’s kind of worrying.’
For a wonderful moment, I feel better – the doll with the smashed head represents me, not Ellen. But then I remember the get rid of Ellen message.
‘You need to tell the police,’ Harry goes on. You look dreadful, so does Ellen. She’s worried about you.’ He pauses. ‘And she’s worried about what will happen when Layla turns up.’
‘I’ve told her it won’t change anything,’ I say curtly, annoyed with Ellen for not only doubting me, but for telling Harry that she does.
‘Well, maybe the way you are at the moment isn’t filling her with confidence.’
I shift uneasily on my chair. Has she somehow sensed the dark thoughts I’ve had about killing her? I run my hands through my hair, haunted by the nightmares I’ve been having. Harry claps me on the back. ‘Come on, let’s go and see Ruby.’
Ellen encourages us to go to The Jackdaw on our own but Harry persuades her to come with us. Ruby is delighted to see Harry and we arrange to have a late lunch, once the rush is over, so that she can join us. The four of us sit with a couple of bottles of wine, laughing and talking, and I feel better than I have for a long time. I catch Ellen throwing me anxious glances and, understanding that she’s worried I’m annoyed with her for inviting Harry down to talk to me, I reach for her hand across the table. Harry notices, and when it’s time to leave, he says he wants to stay and talk to Ruby for a bit, giving me and Ellen a chance to be on our own.
‘You didn’t mind me inviting Harry?’ Ellen asks, as we stroll back to the house.
‘No, it was good to talk to him. He made me see things more clearly.’ And at least I can eliminate him from my list of suspects, I think silently. Which only leaves Ruby and Layla and I’m pretty sure that Ruby isn’t involved. The relief I feel, that it must be Layla, tells me that the darkness I’ve felt over the past few days wasn’t only about not knowing who I could trust, but from the fear she hadn’t come back after all.
‘So will you phone Tony?’
‘Yes,’ I say, realising that was her aim in getting Harry down. ‘I’ll give him a ring on Monday.’
Harry doesn’t stay long when he comes back to the house because he has a dinner in London. After he’s left, I spend a bit of time in my office. I still haven’t received an email from Layla. Is she seriously waiting for me to harm Ellen, to kill her? I slide open my drawer and reach inside, searching for the Russian dolls. I run my fingers over them, drawing a strange comfort from the feel of them. It’s almost as if they’re telling me not to lose faith, that everything will work out in the end. Then my fingers fall on the one with the smashed head and I withdraw my hand quickly. It’s strange that Ellen never asked me for the one she saw me with in The Jackdaw, has never asked if she can add it to her set of Russian dolls, like the one she received in the post. It stands next to the one she found on the wall, two twin sisters staring blank-eyed at me from the worktop.
By the time night falls, I can’t bear the silence any longer. I encourage Ellen to go up to bed and take out my mobile.
When can we meet? I ask. I don’t really expect her to reply because she didn’t to the last ones I sent her asking the same thing. But this time, a reply comes straight back.
Did you get the doll?
When can we meet? I ask again, ignoring her.
Did you get the doll?
Yes, I reply because there’s no point in going around in circles. When can we meet?
When you’ve done what you have to do
What do you mean? I ask, remembering Harry’s theory that the doll got damaged in the post.
You’ve seen the doll
A wave of fury takes hold of me.
It’s not going to happen, never! Goodbye Layla.
I throw my phone down on the sofa as if it’s become toxic. Somewhere along the way, Layla has lost her mind. What she’s suggesting, what she wants me to do, is madness.
I wait a while, then go quietly upstairs, hoping Ellen will be asleep. She’s in her usual sleep mode, one arm behind her head on the pillow, beautiful, desirable. Go on, a voice taunts. Get in beside her, prove that you love her more than Layla. After all, you’ve just chosen her over Layla. She stirs, half-opens her eyes, holds out her arms to me, smiling sleepily.
‘I’m going for a shower.’ I speak in a whisper, an encouragement to her to go back to sleep. Disappointment shadows her face and she drops her arms.
In the shower, I try to wash some of my shame away. But when I get out its stain is still there, making it impossible for me to get into bed beside Ellen.
I wander the
house restlessly. My body aches with fatigue; I’ve barely slept in three days. In the sitting room, I lie down on the sofa, hoping sleep will take me. Something digs me in the back and I realise it’s my mobile, from when I threw it down. I don’t want to check my emails, I don’t want to find one from Layla, I’m not ready for another of her ultimatums. But maybe it will be the message you’ve been waiting for, says a voice, the one that will give you a time and a place, the one that will tell you the Russian doll with the smashed head was a joke. So I check my emails and find one from Layla.
YOU HAVE TEN DAYS
FORTY-ONE
Layla
There was something about smashing the little doll’s head that was strangely satisfying. My own head felt better after, and I wondered if maybe I’d smashed the voice out of it, the one that kept dragging me back to the past, taunting me with visions of how things could have been. But I’d only quietened it because, after a few days of relative calm, it came back, driving me on, propelling me forward to an end I didn’t yet know.
Finn’s reaction to the Russian doll was predictable. Disbelief, anger, blunt refusal. I almost laughed at his last message, at the implication that he had any choice in the matter, as if his ‘Goodbye Layla’ actually meant something, actually meant that he was never going to contact me again, or read any more emails from me. Didn’t he realise that he was dancing to my tune and still had a lot of steps to learn?
I couldn’t keep him dancing forever though. The strain of keeping it together was beginning to tell on me. The voice began to intrude more and more and the effort of blocking it out made my head tired. I needed to impose a deadline. I couldn’t let Finn prevaricate indefinitely. It wasn’t good for him.
And it certainly wasn’t good for me.
FORTY-TWO
Finn
Reading Layla’s message, I prepare myself mentally for ten days of silence. I doubt she’ll be emailing me unless I tell her what she wants to hear and as I won’t ever be able to, I won’t be emailing her. At first, I feel lost – how am I going to last ten days without some sort of contact with her when a day without news is already difficult? But then disquiet sets in at what might happen once the ten days are up. Surely Ellen won’t be in danger from Layla? But what if she is? I feel torn between my desire for Layla and my desire to protect Ellen. Now, more than ever, I need to tell Tony. But I feel stuck in an impasse, unable to move. Maybe a ten-day silence will be a good thing. I’ll have time to clear my head, devote myself to Ellen, work out a strategy. We’ll go away for a few days and I might even begin to forget about Layla.